Author prefers suicide work

Press, 6 November 1978, Page 4

Author prefers suicide work

By NANCY CAWLEY Well known for novels i such as “One Pair of Hands” ■and “My Turn to Make the |Tea,” the British author and I journalist, Monica Dickens.. | still rates her founding of khe United States’ first branch ■of the Samaritans in Boston in 1974 as her most satisfying achievement. I In her autobiography, “An iOpen Book,” which she is in New Zealand to promote, she isays of her work as director and volunteer worker with ithe 100-member Samaritan team in Boston: “My life has; changed. I had thought that ! writing, was enough but it is too egocentric a wav of I life to be honourable.” The Samaritans specialise in suicide prevention. “It. deifinitely works.” Miss. Dickens says, “and the Boston branch j

is the busiest in the world. ' receiving over 50,000 calls and visits a year.” In Britain, where thev are celebrating the twenty-fifth I anniversary of the .Samari- . tans, a recent survey showed: 'a 38 per cent drop in the sui-i cide rate in areas where the! movement is working, But writing is still a big part of Monica Dickens' life. The great grand-daughter of Charles Dickens lives in a t quiet Cape Cod village with ' her husband. Commander i Roy Stratton, now retired i from the United States Naw. Living at a private beach. - with no smog, and a good ; climate, her husband researches and writes books on American naval history while ' she adds to her 30-book out- ■ put, does “the odd article.” > and reviews books for the l“Boston Globe.”